


The Stars of Leo

by TheDragonofHouseMormont



Series: The Stars of Leo [1]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Hybrid Child!Fitz, Hybrid Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-17
Updated: 2016-01-17
Packaged: 2018-05-14 09:47:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5739019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDragonofHouseMormont/pseuds/TheDragonofHouseMormont
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You think that one day you'll lose him, that he'll die trying to keep you safe. He is more like his parents than I think any of us want to admit, he will rage against death and time and anything that will threaten to take away the people he loves."</p><p>In which Leo Fitz is the child of the Doctor and Clara because that theory is beautiful and perfect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Stars of Leo

Will was dead and Fitz wouldn't talk to her about it. He wouldn't tell her what happened or what he saw or how Will had died. She sat curled up on her bed in the dark of her room, trying to keep the sick feeling in her stomach and not let it rise. Six months ago things were so much less complicated. She and Fitz were going to go on their first date, which was world-changing and nerve-wracking enough. Since then she had fought for her life on an alien planet, loved someone else, lost that someone else, and nearly lost Fitz too. She could barely handle it on her own, but Fitz's silence was making things worse for both of them.

There was only one thing she knew she could do, and she'd only done it a handful of times. There were very few people in the world who could get through to Fitz if she couldn't. Well, very few people in the universe - most of them didn't live in this world.

She dug through her sock drawer which had been left exactly the same since her disappearance, until she'd thrown half the pairs of socks onto the floor. Pressed flat against the bottom of the drawer was the small, folded up piece of paper she was looking for. She opened it up and saw the long, strange sequence of numbers. It would mean nothing to anyone who didn't already know what it was. She pulled out her cellphone and quickly typed the numbers in, pressing call, and hoping that this would be one of the times someone on the other end picked up immediately.

"Hello?" a woman's voice asked. She sounded young but Jemma knew better.

"Clara?" she asked in return.

There was a moment of hesitation on the other side which Jemma knew came from the woman quickly flicking through the short list of people who would know her true name. "Jemma!" The woman - Clara - finally, exclaimed in a nearly maternal tone.

"I didn't know who else to call," Jemma quickly said before Clara could continue.

"Leo?" Clara asked, concern creeping into her tone.

"Yes," Jemma replied meekly, keeping her emotions below the surface. "Do you have a moment?"

"It's a time machine, I always have a moment."

"Can you lock on to my location?" Jemma didn't wait for a reply, she knew Clara could. She stepped out of her room, wincing against the lights, and sprinting down the hall. "Follow it. I'm heading downstairs to a room big enough." After a minute she threw open the door to a training room and hopped inside, closing the door behind her. "Okay, where I am now, you can land here."

The call ended and a second later she heard the tell-tale sounds of a Tardis landing. Materializing in front of her was a small, 50s-themed, American diner. She hoped no one had any plans of using this room for the next few hours.

The door of the diner opened and two woman around the same height as Jemma herself stepped out. One of them had long hair falling all the way down her back and the other had short hair that only just brushed against her shoulders. "What's wrong?" Clara, the short-haired woman asked as she quickly stepped forward and pulled Jemma into a hug.

When she pulled back a moment later Jemma finally responded. "How much has he told you about the last six months?"

Clara reached into her pocket and pulled out a pair of sunglasses. Putting them on she looked around the room and then gazed at Jemma through them. "In your timestream it's been a good seven months since I spoke to either of you, so the answer would be nothing. Also, are you aware that their are trace amounts of bacteria in your system that aren't native to Earth?"

Jemma nodded. "That's part of it, actually. Six months ago I was sucked through a portal to another world. I've only just gotten back recently. Fitz was the one who saved me. Hydra wanted to take advantage of that to bring back this terrible creature from that planet; they forced Fitz to show them the way, but since he's come back he hasn't said a word to me about what happened during that trip."

"What?" Clara shook her head in disappointment, scolding her. "He should have said something, one of you should have contacted me. Where is he right now?"

"In his room. I'll show you." Jemma gestured for the women to follow as she led them back to the dormitory part of the complex.

When she reached his door, she knocked, hoping she'd be able to explain everything in the moment before Clara made herself known.

He opened the door, blinking back sleep. It was late, though Jemma hadn't paid any attention to _how_ late. "Jemma, what—"

"I'm sorry, Fitz. I'm worried about you and I didn't know who else to call." She stepped aside and Clara took her place.

Fitz took a half step back in surprise. "Mum?"

"Can I come in?" Clara asked, stepping inside his room without waiting for his answer. "Why did you never call?"

Jemma and Clara's companion, the immortal Ashildr, followed her inside. Fitz gaped at his mother, unsure how to answer. He sat down at his desk. "Why did you come here, mum?"

"Because you're my son and your best friend is worried about you, why else?" She stared down at him in frustration. Jemma expected her to take a deep breath, but her chest never rose. Clara leaned on the desk next to him. "Tell me what happened."

It wasn't his mother he looked at, but Jemma. He stared at her in anguish, his eyes staring into hers. A long moment passed before he whispered, "I'm sorry." He straightened his posture, but he did not break his gaze. "When I got there I found Will pretty quickly. I thought he was fine. He wasn't. He'd been dead for a while. He died..." His voice trailed off and he swallowed, trying to find it again. "He died saving you." And though he still did not look away from her, Jemma could tell he wasn't seeing her in that moment - he was seeing the past, he was seeing the future. "The man I thought was Will was the creature. Death, whatever it wants to be called. I burned him - it - alive. Stood there and watched the flames." She could see the tears roll down his cheeks in the dim light. "I'm sorry."

It wasn't until Ashildr reached out and touched her arm that Jemma realized she was crying too.

Clara cupped her son's face, pulling his gaze away. "Why didn't you ask for help? I had no idea Jemma was missing. You could have called."

He stared up at his mother and shook his head. "I couldn't. We didn't understand what the obelisk does, even when I figured out it was a portal I didn't know where it led. You can't fly your Tardis in and save the day if you don't know where to go. More than that, I was scared. I didn't want you to come in and say there was nothing you could do. As long as I didn't know for sure, I could still hope she was alive."

Clara kneeled down in front of him and glanced back at the other two. "Can I have a moment alone with my son?"

Ashildr nodded and pulled Jemma from the room and into the hall. As soon as the door separating them closed, Jemma broke down into tears. "This is all my fault. All of it. He should never have had to do that, he should never have gone to that planet." She slid down the wall to sit on the floor.

"What do you mean?" Ashildr asked. "How is this your fault?"

"He did it to protect me. He gave up his oxygen for me, jumped through a portal to another world for me, and returned there just to protect me. Just to keep me alive."

Ashildr slowly lowered herself to the ground to sit next to Jemma. "What do you know about his parents?"

Jemma shrugged her shoulders. "His father is an alien, the legendary Doctor. Sometimes his mother takes that name too. They travel in time."

"That's the basic idea, yeah. There's a lot more to it, though. Did you know that despite being from separate species and being born on planets far from each other, in different time zones, and with radically different lifespans, they've known each other in one way or another their entire lives? Part of it's due to time travel, but a lot of it is because of love."

"I never pegged you for a romantic," Jemma half-joked, half-sobbed.

"Cynicism is for the young," Ashildr responded like it was common sense, and Jemma was reminded that despite the apparent ages of the women who had arrived that night, they were both far older than she could comprehend. "They have never let anything stop them from keeping each other safe, not even death. Clara once tore herself into billions of pieces and scattered them throughout his entire life. Their timestreams are so tightly entwined that they cannot be pulled apart. Once, billions of years ago and, I suppose, a couple of months ago, Clara died and there was nothing he could do. He spent four and a half billion years killing himself over and over and over again, slowly breaking his way through a wall tougher than diamond with his bare hands, just so he could face the impossible and save her. That is how she still stands today, in a body that doesn't breathe, with a heart that doesn't beat."

"Why would you tell me this?" Jemma imagined the pain those billions of years of grief must have caused and her heart felt like it was burning through her ribs. She wished she couldn't understand it, but she remembers those nine days by his side in the infirmary and she can understand it all too well.

"Because you're scared. And you should be. You think that one day you'll lose him, that he'll die trying to keep you safe. He is more like his parents than I think any of us want to admit, he will rage against death and time and anything that will threaten to take away the people he loves. But I've got a feeling you're not too different from them either, if a bit more level-headed. Trust him, trust yourself, don't hold back, and never give up." She stood, her back still against the wall, and glanced back down at Jemma once more. "But also, try not to destroy the universe."

Jemma was going to ask what she meant by that when the door opened again and Clara joined them in the hall. Jemma immediately jumped to her feet, curious how it went. "He needs some time to rest," Clara told her. She started walking down the hall and Jemma fell into step with her. "Thank you," Clara continued. "For calling me. I'm glad he has you and all his other friends here. Whenever we get a chance to catch up, he talks all the time about you and Mack and Skye."

"Daisy," Jemma corrected. "Skye prefers to be called Daisy now."

"Hmm. Innocence, loyalty, love, what an interesting promise to make," Clara said thoughtfully. "Do you know why we named him Leo?" Jemma shook her head. "That's where he was born. We were on his father's Tardis, floating through the constellation of Leo. That boy was born with the universe in his hearts, the light of stars in his eyes, and the vibration of deep space in every cry. From the moment he took his first breath I knew he would go on his own adventure some day and I have feared it. That day has come. Nobody's ever safe, I know that better than most, but please, look after him."

**Author's Note:**

> This was meant to just be a one shot, but now that I have written Hybrid Child!Fitz, I just want to write more. So I imagine there will definitely be more in the near future.


End file.
